Hail

We stopped working on the vines to have coffee. Within seconds the skies blackened and filled with what I can only describe as torrential mist. We decided to have an early lunch so Ali fired up the soup whilst we sat in the mazet loggia placing buckets under the leaks. The rain was, by now, torrential.

After lunch we whizzed the tractors into the shed, gathered all the equipment together and made a dash for the cars.

Once we were home the skies began to rumble very loudly, lightning cracked and hail crashed from the sky.

In the space of an hour there was more rain than I've seen in four years. Now we just have to see what damage the hail has done to the buds on our vines. I am praying it won't have knocked too many off, otherwise we'll have a repeat of 2008 when we lost 99% of our harvest.